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But then his mouth was crashing down on hers and she couldn’t think at all.
She went stock still, her body turning to putty in his ferocious grip. He had a hold of her in all ways—his hands clamped on her upper arms, his body cleaved to hers against the SUV. And his mouth…oh, his mouth. It seized hers with a command she’d never experienced before in her twenty-seven years. His lips were forceful and soft, opening her to his surprisingly gentle invasion before her brain had a chance to click back into gear. If it even could. Once his tongue swept over hers, she was lost, adrift. There was nothing but heat and pleasure and need.
And him. Just him.
The slam of the SUV door forced them apart. Colt held her at arm’s length, breathing hard while his wild gaze roamed her face. She sensed a question there, but she couldn’t decipher what it was. Her voice was gone. She couldn’t do anything but breathe unsteadily and wait for the thunderous roar in her ears to dim.
Drake walked around to stand beside them and tilted her face up with a single finger under her chin. “Are you okay?”
She nodded, still struck mute. Someday she’d remember how to speak again, right?
“So I just want to know one thing.” The corner of Drake’s mouth ticked up. “Are you spending the night at our place? Or are we coming to yours?”
2
Drake Mondell watched his two friends struggle to process what he’d just asked—and what they’d just done. He waited for the objections that were sure to come.
It was just a kiss. Just an adrenaline-based response to a scary experience. If he hadn’t seen the lust burning in his best friend and business partner’s eyes as he’d tried to reel himself back from tasting Paige, maybe he would’ve left it alone. Not pressed harder. God knows he hadn’t pressed in so very long. He and Colt had shared women a few times, but not for over a year. Not since the night Drake had gone too far and revealed his hand.
Since then, he’d railed at himself often. If only he hadn’t pushed for more. Hadn’t followed a moment toward what seemed like an obvious conclusion to him, though Colt clearly hadn’t felt the same.
He’d shoved it all down under a mask of indifference. What choice did he have? Colt was straight. Arrow-straight, at least if you asked him. He enjoyed raising some hell, and he definitely didn’t have a problem with sharing a woman with his best friend now and then, but between the sheets, he didn’t look at men the same way he did women. That was his right, and Drake would give him all the space in the world to make that choice. He’d been trying to do just that for the past year.
The fact that he’d fallen for his best friend years ago was his problem. And his alone.
But that didn’t mean he would overlook this chance to set things back to rights between them. He couldn’t have Colt sexually, and he got that. He’d even made his peace with it, for the most part. What he could have was the energy that flowed between them when they shared a woman. It went so far beyond sex, and he was pretty sure that was also true for the woman involved. They made it good for her, cherishing her for the hours they spent together. In a way, cherishing each other too. Any woman between them hadn’t been eager for the experience to end.
Tonight it would be Paige, a woman he had great affection for. If she was on board.
If Colt was.
“Not her,” Colt said quickly. Too quickly. It meant he’d been considering it. Wanting what the three of them could be together…and
just wanting her, period.
“Not me,” Paige agreed, before giving Colt a slow blink. “Have you done this before?”
“What? No. Done what?”
“Smooth, man.” Drake shook his head. Normally Colt didn’t trip up around women. He was the personification of charm and easy sex appeal, but something about Paige set him off his rhythm. Drake had seen it before when they’d stopped into the grain store she owned with Charlene—
Ah, Jesus, he was a moron. There it was. Charlene. This was Charlene’s best friend. Colt saw Paige as off-limits. Though Char obviously hadn’t felt the same about Colt’s brother, now had she? He understood they’d had some lingering feelings since they’d been teenagers, but still. If Char hadn’t stayed away from Wade out of consideration for her ex-husband, Colt obviously didn’t have to stay on the other side of some invisible line when it came to Paige.
Good luck convincing him of that, though.
“No, you’re asking me to come over and—and—” Paige broke off and pushed an unsteady hand through her long, wavy strawberry-blond hair. Some of it was pinned back, but all of it was trying to get free, the curls teased loose by the warm summer breeze. “I may not be the most experienced woman on the planet, but I’m getting the vibe this isn’t y’all’s first rodeo.”
“We don’t do that anymore.” Colt stepped back and raked a hand through his hair. “It’s been a long time. We put it behind us,” he added, giving Drake a hard stare.
You put it behind you. He didn’t voice the words on the tip of his tongue, as hard as it was. Instead he spoke to Paige. Her confusion and discomfort aroused a need to soothe. If she wasn’t interested, that was more than fine. He only wanted them to have a good time. He definitely didn’t want her to become upset due to the offer.
“What he’s trying to say,” Drake began, “is we’ve shared women a few times. Just not recently.”
“Shared women? Whoa.” She pressed a hand to her head. “I mean, I’d gotten there on my own, but put so bluntly, yeah, whoa.” Her fingers circled her temple. “I so didn’t drink enough for this.”
“He’s just talking out of his ass. Ignore him.” Colt immediately moved forward again, taking her hand though she shot him a suspicious look. He, too, obviously felt called to alleviate her concerns. “It doesn’t mean anything.”
She tipped her head back against the Chevy, as if she no longer possessed the strength to keep it up on her own. “But you kissed me.”
